21 December 2011

Claims of racism on the ban of muslim calls to worship are possibly ill founded. The loudspeakers for these calls carry through the very early morning air and wake up lots of folks who are trying to sleep. They're annoying, particularly because its for some damned religion that contributes nothing but misery to the world.

15 December 2011

Our gaming group hasn't met for about three months now. Its been a long series of late work nights, business travel and catching up at home. Now the holidays. Luckily, my sidetrack adventures in Flash and Javascript have given me enough gaming junk to keep away serious withdrawal systems (for those who don't know, I'm dabbling in RPG tools writing.)

Another big injection of gaming comes from surfing the internet. This site is a goldmine, particularly today's photos. If you're a gamer interested in dungeon delving, you simply must follow this tumblr site.

22 November 2011

I'm sad to say, the pepper spraying brutality in UC Davis this past weekend came as no surprise to me. I've witnessed too much police brutality first hand over the last year to be surprised by it anymore.

13 November 2011

I arrived back home yesterday. Jet lag is kicking my butt! After two weeks in Japan, two weeks in San Jose, two weeks in India, and now back in San Jose, my body can't tell if its day or night or inside out and upside down.

Tomorrow starts another early morning as I get up at 6:30 am and am off to the San Francisco to survey the damage of last week's layoff. At least I'll be home at a decent hour and can sleep on the train there and back.

10 November 2011

Yet another time I witnessed police brutality. This time it was on the street corner in Noida.

I was in the cab riding to the office. There's a busy intersection right outside the office. Cars, bikes, rickshaws, cows, dogs, pedestrians, motorcycles, scooters, you name it. They all crowd through the intersection all times of day and night.

As we turn through the intersection I notice a young chap and a policeman talking alongside the road. It seemed rather innocuous and I gave it little attention at first. However, for seeming no apparent cause, just as the cab passed the duo the policeman reached out, grabbed the young fellow by the hair, pulled him forward and gave him a hard karate chop across the side of the neck.

The blow nearly knocked the victim over as he tried to pull away. There was absolutely no visible threat from the young man. Pure police brutality. Uncalled for.

07 November 2011

Book binding. (I can't be the only person who bemoans the way new rulebooks tend to fall apart like a sheaf of dry leaves after about 5 seconds of use).

I'm all digital these days.

"Doing a voice". How many people "do voices"? Should they? How do you get better at "doing a voice" if that's your thing?

I almost never do voices, though when the inspiration for the NPC is someone I've known I often break out into voices.

Breaks. How often do you have breaks within sessions?

We have marathon sessions of 6 hours or more - most often without breaks. Players come and go as their character enter or leave the action. There are frequent scenes where a character is out of the action for one reason or another (we don't generally do underground dungeons), so individuals can take breaks regularly.

Description. Exactly how florid are your descriptions?

There's so much gaming to cram into a session that my descriptions usually have one or two senses described (most often visual or auditory, with the occasional scent or general malaise.) Players' imagination of a scene is much better than I can describe improvisationally.

Where do you strike the balance between "doing what your character would do" and "acting like a dickhead"?

Oddly, the characters in our games tend to not be murderous cretins most of the time.

PC-on-PC violence. Do your players tend to avoid it, or do you ban it? Or does anything go?

Players generally act in concert at our gaming table; but, player-vs-player activity does happen every couple of sessions. Its very much in character when it happens. Perhaps the worst bout was when I was a player and, honor bound by an oath to my king, I challenged another player to single combat. Although wounded, my character triumphed and the other player had to roll up another character.

How do you explain what a role playing game is to a stranger who is also a non-player? (Real life example: my friends and I were playing in the local M:tG club space. A M:tG groupie teenage goth girl came over and asked, "What are you playing?" "[We answered.]" "Sounds kind of gay.")

Improvisational theater with dice.

Alchohol at the table?

Players are welcome to consume whatever vice they please so long as they don't disrupt the table. As referee, I can't really do my job well even after a single drink or drag. So I stay sober.

What's acceptable to do to a PC whose player is absent from the session? Is whatever happens their fault for not being there, or are there some limits?

We aim to start and end an adventure all in one sitting. Thus we have marathon sessions. Absent players' characters are also absent. This is true even when the adventure stretches multiple sessions, in which case we simply turn a blind eye to a character not being there for one session but present for another.

04 November 2011

Grrrr. 5:12am every morning, without fail, there's some religious fool singing very poorly into a PA system right outside my hotel window. I can't tell if its some Islamic call to prayer or a Hindu ritual; I suspect the former.

Either way, its terribly rude to wake up everyone at that time of day. I guess I should expect no better from religious idiots. Rude and insufferable to the core! Every last one of them.

01 November 2011

I arrived in Bangalore about five hours ago (its 6:45am here). Although many months of my life have been spent in Noida/New Dehli, this is the first time I've gone south to Bangalore. I must say, the city is much cleaner and more appealing than the New Dehli area.

Traffic is still insane here, maybe even worse than Noida. On the 6 lane super-highway between here and the airport there were frequent breaks - as in the highway disappeared and we drove on dirt and rubble for a kilometer or two. There's also the incessant horns and crazy number of animals about. But there isn't the same amount of refuse or rampant homelessness that you find in New Dehli (at least not in the areas I rode through at night.)

The weather is also beautiful here. I'm currently eating breakfast on a veranda over a swimming pool. There's a gentle breeze sifting through palm fronds and fig trees. The ground is a bit muddy and the skies washed clean from last night's thunderstorms.

Unfortunately, the relaxing breakfast will end all too soon as the work is piled high over the next few weeks. I doubt I'll get to see the city much at all, even on the weekend.

31 October 2011

So I’ve been stymied in gaming lately and we’ve not been able to get our group together for over a month. Now I’m off for two weeks to India and won’t be able to get my gaming fix. So to tide me over, I’ve come up with an idea for a one-shot adventure in the creepy high fantasy world of Elric of Melniboné. I’m not sure when we’ll be able to play it.

Below are ten possible characters for players to pick up. They are split into four groups:

A Dark Gothic Party of evil Chaos worshippers.

A Bright Chaos Party with a sorceress from Melniboné itself.

A Domain of Man Party trying to bring Balance and Law to a troubled world.

Random characters that would fit in any of the above three parties.

The characters are purposefully unbalanced, as I think our group can handle that type of situation very well and come up with a good story. Relative power levels (10 = bad ass, 1 = red shirt) are given for each character.

Dark Gothic Party

Play two truly evil characters and worshippers of chaos: a high priest of death and his cousin, a mercenary captain with a dubious past.

Prefect Thule Krin, Governor of Mist Marsh Colony
High Priest of Chardhros (The Reaper of Souls, Lord of Chaos)
Power Level 10Thule rules over his dank demesne with brooding animosity. Upon dominating the Demon Grishom and invoking Lassa, Ruler of the Open Sky, Thule was acknowledged a master of his craft. The Theocrat, envious and threatened by those who reach such degenerate depths so aptly, could not retaliate boldly without angering Thule’s allies at the Temple of Chaos. So Thule was awarded a prefecture and governorship on a far flung southern colony.

Thule bides his time tithing the miserable swampfolk and watching over white capped waves of the Dragon Sea. He waits for an opportunity to rise in glory and power so that he might return triumphantly to his homeland in Pan Tang.

Pangaarl Krin, Corsair of Pan Tang
Power Level 6Noble blood in the Theocracy can mean only one thing, fighting. A scion of the House of Krin, Pangaarl chose to escape deadly politics of Hwamgaarl by hiring a ship of cutthroats to ply the Dragon Sea. Pangaarl’s ship was shattered while chasing a merchant cog into the Serpents Teeth, a stretch of coastline noted for treacherous shoals and powerful currents. Bankrupt but alive, Pangaarl found his way south into the shifting sands of the Silent Lands. There he led his few remaining ne’er-do-wells into raids on the weak and impoverished swampfolk who lived in fetid swamps along the northern edge of the sandy dunes.

The Lords of Chaos smiled upon Pangaarl when his cousin, Thule, was appointed governor of Mist Marsh. Pangaarl now works as Prefect Thule’s mercenary captain at the Castle of Tumbling Lotus.

Bright Chaos Party

Play an exotic Melnibonéan enchantress and her bodyguard.

Eralda of Melniboné, Sorceress of the 3rd Circle
Power Level 9Always hungry to read, Eralda devoured every treatise, book, tome and scrap of paper that could be found in the Mistral Tower. She soon grew bored of the vapid meanderings of her friends’ drug-addled thoughts and sought the deeper knowledge of her ancestors. Eralda cajoled, coerced or stole whatever secrets she could from the decadent Melniboné wizards. She slowly built an impressive grimoire of summonings, bindings and evocations to rival any of those in the Dreaming City. Eralda reckoned herself ready for any challenge.

When a human merchant offered Eralda’s father her uncle’s library, Eralda found the money to purchase the waterlogged books herself. She carefully sifted through them. Disappointed at not actually finding any jewels of sorcerous insight, Eralda nevertheless admired her uncle’s meticulous observations of the chaos tendrils over which he’d built his laboratory. Intrigued and eager for adventure, Eralda hired an Imrryrian pinnace to take her to her uncle’s last abode.

Bek, Eshmir Slave
Power Level 5Slave and lover to Eralda, Bek is devoted to her mistress. In return, Eralda takes a keen interest in the lithe girl and cares for her as someone might a beloved pet. To please Bek, Eralda ensured Bek was instructed in the use of buckler and short sword. Bek has now twice saved Eralda from worse than death on nighttime escapades: once forcing the Conjurer Abdin-go-Rushi of Shazaar to release a grating nemesis bound to his personal protection; and, and once gutting two Vilmirian guards menacing Eralda in the twisted streets of Old Hrolmar.

Bek stands beside Eralda as the two gaze warily out to sea over the pinnace’s bow.

Domain of Man Party

The only non-chaotic party, this group sets out on a holy quest in service to the Ruler of Elemental Earth and Servitor of Balance.

Isabelle, Jeweler of Belrain
Power Level 8Isabelle was born into the wealthy family of a jeweler to Duke Belrain. The priests of Grome, Ruler of Earth and Stone, recognized the latent sorcery in her veins. Pressed into worship in the caverns under the central highlands, Isabelle longed for her family and friends along the coastal towns of Belrain. Unable to devote herself fully to Grome, she slowly drifted away from the Deep Mystery. When she found herself pregnant, she left the cult’s warrens and returned home.

Isabelle was crushed when her child was stillborn. Seeking solace, she left again for Grome’s cavern temples. Isabelle found the droning incantations to stone and soil a way to soothingly forget her pain. Though she did not enter the priesthood, she eventually reached the First Depth. As a Shephard, Isabelle learned to care for the luxuriant plants and magical herbs that grew in verdant gardens above the temples.

Isabelle fears the holy quest all devotees must undergo at their reaching of the First Depth. With hesitant hope, she sends word to her lover of old in hopes that he will come to her aid.

Sir Antin Ul-Kurick of Girnoble
Power Level 5A gallant knight from the land of Vilmir, Sir Antin has family scattered across the many realms of the Young Kingdoms. Before gaining his inheritance he sailed the wide world, eventually making a semi-permanent home in the opulent city of Belrain along the western coast of the Isle of Purple Towns. There he met and fell in love with a common lady of the bourgeoisie, who took herself at times away from the dark inland temples back to her homeland by the sea. Though he could not marry someone of low birth, he treated her well and the two kept a dalliance whenever she returned. Antin was called home when his father fell gravely ill.

Sir Antin put the household in order after his father's death. Then began the slow, drudging days of stewarding the family estate. When word came from his old beloved, Isabelle of Belrain, Antin leapt at her plea for help. He left his sister as steward of the estates, gathered his horse and squire, and hired a vessel out to sea.

Deacon Elga Gonwin
Power Level 5Dour and efficient, Deacon Elga quickly found her calling in the inland temples. Raised in the soggy highlands of the Isle of Purple Towns, Deacon Elga was naturally drawn to the workshops of Grome. Never one for delicate metalwork or fancy gemstones, Elga preferred to beat out plowshares and horseshoes for her family and village. Her strength slowly grew to rival that of most men, though always others gawked at the bulky woman who toiled at the forge.

Lacking talent to coax the essence of Earth to her bidding, Elga nevertheless took heart in the tranquil silence of worshipping Grome. She grew more devoted to her god. A certain benevolent joy began to pervade her being. She learned to treat the minor pains and discomforts of those around her. In servitude to the Lord of Earth and Stone, Elga accepted the mantle of Deacon of the First Depth.

Elga now calmly faces the trials before her, confident her soul will find the peaceful repose of Earth whatever may happen to her body.

Characters for Any Party

Fan-Liet, Sailor
Power Level 1 (or 5, depending on how he’s played)Fan-Liet’s own opinion of himself matched that of others around him, stupid and weak. Too small to work as a man in the rice fields, Fan-Liet was relegated to the backbreaking work of the planting women. Finding peace by taking his makeshift coracle out upon the rocky sea, he learned to navigate the deadly currents of the Serpents Teeth around his village home. Nobody seemed to miss him when he sailed off alone, so his jaunts began to grow longer and more daring. At times he would spend three or four days away from home, exploring jagged cliffs and deep firths cut into the coastal mountains.

One day Fan-Liet saw a graceful ship sailing briskly through the choppy sea. Thinking the captain foolhardy to use canvas in such wind, Fan-Liet lingered to see what might happen to the vessel. Perhaps when its hull was torn out from beneath it Fan-Liet could salvage some golden trinket and be rich!

Odonata, Myrrhyn Bowman
Power Level 6The insect-like race of Myrrhyn make most humans’ blood run cold. Few find any compunction against killing Myrrhyn simply due to their alien countenance. Nevertheless Myrrhyn vary as much in demeanor and outlook as any human civilization, though often they feel closest to their goddess Straasha.

Odonata is a poet at heart, traveling the world to witness the colorful variety of life throughout the Young Kingdoms. Though somewhat small and fragile by human standards, Odonata finds many who are willing to pay good bronze for his ability to shoot accurately from on wing.

Dorkara-Bel-Mek, Dreg of Society
Power level 3A lowly peasant from a decrepit land, Dorkara-Bel-Mek scrounges a living off the efforts of others. The Org were once a powerful race of sorcerers; but, the eons have thinned their blood and addled their brains. Now they are a disreputable lot of hirsute dwarfs cowering beneath the eaves of their tangled forest homes. Some ancient longing in Dorkara’s heart drew her to the excitement of human cities. There she found only the same misery of her homeland. Dorkara knew remorse and pitied herself.

Now Dorkara skulks human lands looking for whatever means she can to survive.

24 October 2011

I've not been a big fan of the Orange Satan, Dailykos, for a few years. The constant horse race chatter drives me away - that and the fact that I'm disgusted with weak-kneed Democrats and just can't bring myself to cheer them on. Nevertheless, here's a bloody fine post over at Kos that is well worth reading:

As of today we're comfortably done with the baby stuff. All the remaining diapers go to charity. The pacifiers are all thrown away. Now its time to collect all the little one toys and clean them up for Goodwill. Pretty soon we'll have a little extra room in the house, enough to store the presents from the upcoming Christmas.

17 October 2011

If things were to really go in the right direction for a change, we'd see a call for a constitutional convention be taken up within the next year or two in response to this OWS stuff. I'm not yet sure the public is radicalized enough to make it happen, though.

14 October 2011

The steward of Postcombe was a youth when he accepted his responsibility to the landlord, Lord Marshal Rhodri. Shortly thereafter a curse blighted Postcombe. Crops failed to grow. The blight worsened. Hunting proved fruitless the next year. The desperate steward swore his soul to save the village. The demon Ymōraj, yearning for freedom, happily granted his request.

Thereafter miraculous bounties of river fish and crustaceans came. Moreover, thick brambles sprouted from ruined stumps. Some life came back to the naked trees, flittering through burning evening sunlight. The people were saved. By the following summer the fish were gone; but, brambles bore nuts or fruit each according to its kind. Again, Postcombe's peasants fed themselves well.

In time, Ymōraj completely dominated the steward's psyche. The demon mercilessly tormented his captive's tattered soul. Ymōraj longed to display his proud accomplishment and so called for the Lampton Worm, who came crawling on scaled feet to witness for their master. The summoning left satanic scrawl spiraling around Postcombe Chapel. In reward for good service, the Devil granted Ymōraj leave to corrupt the Lord Marshal.

When Ymōraj led a winter hunting expedition to Tarnish Combe each man brought home three stags. Ymōraj, occupying the steward's body, impressed them all by bagging a snowy white hart. He came to be known as the Hero of Postcombe. While the blight spread like a parasite to Lord Marshal Rhodri's other holdings, the peasants of Postcombe where fed by bartered grain and venison all year long.

Ymōraj attended his landlord at the next Good Friday's Horse Race. Ymōraj begged to be made squire to any vassal knight under the commander. Rhodri refused and sent him back to Postcombe. Each year Ymōraj returned and was sent back home disappointed. Yet all the while the demon planted evil seeds in Rhodri's soul. He cultivated a hatred against neighboring Duke Ulfius. Blood spilt between the two great lords.

One day Ulfius and Rhodri faced each other upon the field. Ymōraj made plain the depths of his treachery by fighting against his former lord. Ymōraj attacked from behind while Rhodri held against Duke Ulfius. The Lord Marshal's men overpowered Ulfius and Rhodri turned to Ymōraj. Afterward, the brains of Ymōraj's host were scattered on the grass underneath the old knight's feet. The Hero of Postcombe was no more. What happened to the demon remains unknown.

13 October 2011

Those hoping the White House would have the good sense to follow through with an aggressive jobs message should be pleased. Indeed, Obama and his team clearly seem to believe they have a winning message here.

Yes. I wish this would have happened back in Feb'09. Its not like the problem or solution was hard to see then. I guess we had to wait for an election cycle to kick in before the politicians starting doing what the people want.

11 October 2011

I set myself 15-minutes to do a quick encounter for any random occurrence during our next gaming night. Ever since the death of King Uther they've had a Fey or (un)Holy bent. Here's one for this coming Wednesday, if I can work it into the game session. Otherwise it goes on the shelf for later use.

At nights, from the corners of your eyes and the edge of your hearing, the sound of joyous celebration can be heard coming from an elusive sacrificial offering. A goat is butchered, the blood collected in as many goblets as knights are present. Its clear the goblet on the table is for you and your companions.

Should you leave the ephemera alone you suffer nothing beyond the occasional weird glimpse.

If you taste the blood, any Faerie Longing passion you might possess immediately increases by one and you get a check in it. The ghostly vision becomes reality as your own body stands in a stupor. Gain an Indulgence check as well. This satisfies the Faerie Longing passion for the year.

If you consume the blood, revel in the libations of raw goat flesh, O, Incarnation of Pan! Gain a new Faerie Longing (3d6+2), or +1d6 to an existing passion. Ability to summon the craic once per year. The craic makes everything in the social setting (i.e. court) for one day kinda go your way. Its palpable even to those with whom you don't interact personally that day. +1d20 for any one courtly skill that day. Ad lib those critical successes! Each use: 1d6 (1-4) lose the craic.

If a holy character is present, play up on the association with the Holy Grail and how utterly disgusting and sinful all this pagan celebration appears. In addition to Indulgence, a holy character will get a Worldly check for sampling the libations. Fully quaffing the goblet yields in addition yields +1d6 Worldly and a Worldly check.

Updated: I just realized that the above meme probably came at me as a riff on what James Raggi posted here. - e

03 October 2011

I've decided that theme parks are a special form of torture designed to drive parents absolutely batty. In the last week we've been to three theme parks.

First was the AnpanmanMuseum in Yokohama. Other than the typically bad food and high prices, it was short and the girls were generally well behaved until lunch time. From that point forward it was nothing but whining and temper tantrums until we got on the train home an hour later. My rating: two aspirin.

Second was the Studio GhibliMuseum. This was one that I would have really enjoyed, except that the girls wanted only to play on the Nekobasu and nothing else would do. After making a beeline to the room with the Cat Bus (and dealing with Alisa having a nervous breakdown from fear of the giant stuffed cat), we spent the rest of the time in the cafe dealing with hungry kids who wanted nothing actually on the menu. At least they served beer. My rating: one aspirin.

Today was the penultimate in theme parks, Disneyland. I actually enjoyed myself by the fourth time through "Its a Small World". It was relaxing and we got to sit down - much better than the 80 minute wait to get our picture taken with Mickey Mouse. Still, there probably wasn't a single moment throughout the day when I didn't hear some screaming kid somewhere within earshot. Usually it was one of my kids doing the screaming. Altogether we probably had about three total breakdowns and six or seven good cries from the rides. There were an order of magnitude more laughs and smiles, though. At least it was good exercise having a child in my arms or on my shoulders for 14 hours in a single day. I shouldn't really complain; I'd do it again in a heartbeat and did have fun. My rating: six aspirin spread throughout the day at 6 hour intervals.

28 September 2011

Beside the fact that I'm on vacation and will eat whatever I damn well please, I just couldn't follow a restricted carbohydrate diet in Japan. The noodles here bear little resemblance to that flaccid stuff you find in the States. You can buy bread as good as anything found in Paris (though, perhaps, you have to look a little harder to find it here.) And something in the water makes for terrific rice.

27 September 2011

Its true. Japan is a land filled with so much beauty and great food. I'm happy to be back here again. The last time we came the girls were too small to do anything but stay inside and visit family. This time, we have a chance to get outside and see the town a bit.

The thing I like most about Japan is the ubiquitous tiny boutique. Everything has a store dedicated to it and every hundred feet has some little shop whose owner toils behind the counter doing all the tasks needed to run the place. Today was a day of shopping for myself while the girls were napping. So I splurged by going by my favorite T-Shirt designer's place and haberdashery, followed by a great little joint that makes splendid pork buns with salted turnips and mushrooms.

Tonight I'm hoping to sneak out with Hirono to the neighborhood shochu (local vodka) joint.

18 September 2011

So, my friends know me as an avid gamer. I don't play those video doodads, though I do dabble in historic strategy games on the computer. My real passion is table-top fantasy role playing games (RPGs.) I've been playing since 1979 with a few short breaks. My usual role is as the Referee, Dungeon Master, Game Master, whatever the name might be. The campaigns tend to be intense, both from a combat and an emotional perspective.

The story is paramount and I daydream at length in preparation for the next session while exercising or walking home from work. Right now we're 30 sessions (a long time, about a year and half of folks getting around a table with dice regularly) into a campaign that retells the romantic fantasy of King Arthur.

We started with the players as vassal knights, the tanks of the battlefield in chainmail and shield. Uther Pendragon was king. The player knights were with Merlin when Excalibur came from the Lady in the Lake. The years passed and Uther was assassinated, Arthur hidden by Merlin. What followed is a period of destruction as chaos ruled the land and Saxons poured in from the continent. Last session a young Arthur pulled the sword from the stone at the climax of the session. From start to finish it was a roller coaster of courtly intrigue, warlords dominating the battlefield and unbridled passions. Quite a game!

Each year in the game thus far has a theme song that inspired the story for that year. Below is the song list I've used thus far in the campaign, a list of beloved (if not always great) music that conjures a brutal world of the Dark Ages emerging into chivalric knighthood. For those who know the game system, this is The Great Pendragon Campaign for the system King Arthur Pendragon (version 5.1.)

485 AD - Living in a brutal age
&lt;p&gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;485 AD&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&lt;/p&gt;

486 AD - Recover Excalibur from the Chiltern Witch

487 AD - Scouting the Franks

488 AD - Invasion of Bayeaux

489 AD - Angles Overrun Caer Colun

490 AD - Battle of Lindsey

491 AD - Duke Gorlois Rebels

492 AD - Abduction of Prince Arthur

493 AD - Death in Caer Colun

494 AD - Uther's Illness

495 AD - Death of Uther

496 AD - Anarchy

497 AD - Enemies On All Sides

498 AD - Expansion Into Rydychan

499 AD - On the Brink of Destruction

500 AD - Angles and Their Big Mofo Battle Axes

501 AD - Do or Die

502 AD - Wave After Wave of Saxons

503 AD - Faerie Forest

504 AD - Raven Queen

505 AD - Struggling for SurvivalShut It Tight - by T-Bone Perkins, worth the search on the internet

01 September 2011

I've had a phone plastered against my ear for 3.5 hours straight now. My neck is getting sore.
This is going to continue for another hour before a 15 minute break and then back to meetings. At least the afternoon meetings are in person instead of on the phone.

20 August 2011

Finally! We found a vehicle that they can operate. After tricycles and scooters never really worked out for the girls, I was doubtful when they showed an interest in bicycles. Low and behold! The bike they can do. And they learned within a week of each other. Alisa mastered the art of pedaling first.

Now they want to ride their bikes down to the Farmer's Market tomorrow morning. That's probably too much. My worry is that Leia is a speed demon but hasn't learned to look where she's going yet.

19 August 2011

15 August 2011

Americans Elect is an attempt to change the primary process. It has the promise of changing the way we vote for our political leaders. Only thing is, thus far the user statistics are showing the American people are more left of center than most media states.

I do, however, fear that the organization putting this project together will screw it up. My sneaky suspicion is that Americans Elect users will vote for someone far left of center, such as the Socialist party or the like, and then the backers of americanselect.org will get cold feet and pull out of the election or change their policy. Either that or, perhaps, one of the existing political parties will flood the user base.

08 July 2011

I got a new personal laptop to play around with at home. Its a Dell XPS and it screams for writing Flash, though its not a fancy monitor or anything. It runs Windows 7. This is the first time I've used a Windows system in many years.

Anyway, Google or Bing searches are driving me crazy. Whenever I click on an item I'm taken to some random advertisement instead of the actual URL. In order to get at most URLs I have to load the Google cached page and then click back to the original from the cached page. Its truly annoying. Not every search hit gives me this problem, only about 90%.

06 July 2011

What respect I had for policemen has been completely torn down tonight. Although I was only a bystander, I did witness a man being grabbed by the collar and hauled out of the train station. He sole offense:he looked at a policeman wrongly and mumbled something inarticulate at the same time. He didn't even seem drunk and was definitely not causing problems. The policeman accused the man of calling him an “asshole”, as if that was an excuse for manhandling him. Imagine if a civilian manhandled someone like that.

18 June 2011

Leia's done with diapers - or darned close to it. She still wears them at night; but, during the day is in big kid underpants with few mishaps. Alisa is very close behind. I've promised them we'll go to Disneyland if they can stay in underpants without messing them up. Both of them made huge progress toward this goal yesterday.

Just as big of news, they slept in their own beds last night. Its 7am right now and they're still sound asleep in their own beds.

04 April 2011

I ran across a toddler's toy store recently named "Gone With The Wind". It seems so appropriate. The girls have grown up so fast. Here's Leia receiving her yellow belt in karate with the grace and poise of an adult.

27 March 2011

Back in the US the Christians are the troublesome ones. Here in India, its the Hindi zealots that drive me batty.

As I type this blog entry, there is some fool outside with a PA system shouting Jainist entreaties to the general public. He's very loud in the middle of this very public space - at 9:30pm on a Sunday night. Like religious zealots everywhere, he has no sense of decency.

My run in with Islam this weekend was less troublesome. Apparently some big whig imam from Saudi Arabia was in town. A colleague and I went to a restaurant in Old Delhi which happened to be directly across the street from the mosque which the imam visited. So the streets were completely packed. At least the throngs didn't proselytize in the middle of the night over loud speakers.

23 March 2011

It happens to me occasionally when I cross time zones. Migraines. Debilitating. I had to leave work early today and am in the hotel room taking a rest. Hopefully I'll be back up on my feet and back at the office late this afternoon.

13 March 2011

03 March 2011

The girls are regularly using the potty now. First thing in the morning both of them rush to their potties. Usually their diapers are dry or mostly dry in the morning. There is a light at the end of the diaper tunnel.

07 February 2011

02 February 2011

Here we go again, scheduling a trip to India. The following video really does a great job showing the different environments of New Delhi. As a business traveller, this is exactly the India I see every single trip - good, bad and ugly.

01 February 2011

For those of you who listen only to US-based or UK-based news, you're missing a lot of the context and backstory for the uprisings in the Middle East right now. Al Jazeera provides much more comprehensive and interesting coverage of the events.

I've been reading them off-and-on since I started traveling to India frequently. They don't focus on India; but, they do provide an interesting and more informative alternative to Associated Press or BBC. They've really shined in the last month.

16 January 2011

10 January 2011

If you don't regularly read Professor Myers, you should. His rhetoric is sometimes overly colorful; but, it would be a drab world without color now, wouldn't it?

What we have here is an attempted assassination of a politician by an insane crank at a political event, in a state where the political discourse has been an unrelenting howl of eliminationist rhetoric and characterization of anyone to the left of Genghis Khan as a traitor and enemy of the state…and now, when six (including a nine year old girl) lie dead and another fourteen are wounded, now suddenly we're concerned that it is rude and politicizing a tragedy to point out that the right wing has produced a toxic atmosphere that pollutes our politics with hatred and the rhetoric of violence?

04 January 2011

I was on NHE for many years (10 or so) until the girls were born. Taking care of twin infants and toddlers has kept me from eating correctly or exercising regularly. I'm finally back on NHE as my New Year's Resolution. It is day 3 of the induction period and going strong. It is far and above the most effective diet for fat loss and muscle gain I've ever seen. Heartily recommended; but, you really don't need special clubs or programs beyond understanding the science and putting in the effort yourself.